160237 SE Seminar aus Grammatiktheorie (2007W)

Grammatical Typology: a Syntactic Perspective
This course treats many syntactic concepts in ways that beginning students of syntax are unlikely to be acquainted with. But the questions and issues involved are classical problems in grammar studies, not specific to particular approaches, such as proposed in this course. Hence, study of a set of proposed solutions to classical problems can give a solid understanding of the problems themselves.

Topic 1: Variation in word order in syntax and morpheme order within morphology
Head placement in words and in phrases; Stowell's head-initial vs. head-final.
A unified approach to ordering of heads and non-heads across domain types.
Independence of left-right order from morphological or "word" domains.

Topic 2: Analysis of the "Humboldtian typology": inflecting, agglutinating and isolating systems. Sapir's response.
Case inflection (Indo-European) vs. agglutination (Japanese, Turkish, Bantu)
Agglutination as a fundamental principle of linearity; Anderson's critique in "Where's Morphology?"
Number agreement as the basis of inflection
Merger in Distributed Morphology; Alternative Realization

Topic 3: Correlations between bound morphology and word order types
Possible relations between overt Case morphology and free word order
Example systems: Chichewa, Slavic. Dutch, Chinese as counter-examples
The problem of formulating "sufficient conditions" for free word order
Free word order and sentence functional perspective

Topic 4: Contribution of overt verb agreement to subject-predicate typology
Fukui and Speas (1986). Open vs. Close Projections.
Kuroda's (1991) parameter:: "Whether we agree or not"
A revision: not "Japanese may not agree" but "Japanese must not agree"

Topic 5: Typology in NPs: counting with plurals and counting with classifiers.
RecastingJackendoff's (1977) classic analysis of English.
Ino0-European QP projections: Existential vs. Universal Quantifiers.
The Japanese system: counting with N but not with Q.

Topic 6: Unifying counting typology with agreement typology: "Q projects"
Kuroda's explanation of the EPP: I must be valued for number.
The nature of Q and SPEC(Q) across categories. Measure phrases
Non-projecting Q (Japanese) vs. Projecting Q (Indo-European)

Topic 7: A typological difference which isn't one: "clausal size"
V2 root clause systems vs. English root clauses
A lexical difference between English and other Germanic languages
Rizzi's (1997) "articulated left periphery"
"C visibility": a universal condition interacting with the lexicon.
Explanation of differences between English and V2 systems